Before there were blogs there were these things called magazines, and the only metal magazine we still get excited about reading every month is Decibel. Here’s managing editor Andrew Bonazelli…

Decibel Deleted Scenes time. We couldn’t quite cram this into the splattered entrails of January’s Cryptopsy HOF, but Adrien Begrand compiled some stirring None So Vile testimonials from the technical death metal legends’ peers. Here are those musicians’ choice cuts on our latest inductee.

John Longstreth (Gorguts, Origin)

“Slit Your Guts”—what an amazing death metal song, right? That screamy, shrill intro piece—it sounds like they were paying homage to a drill press. The stop at 0:25, the solo is beautiful, the opening lyrics are “Pardon, please…” Holy cow, what went wrong with these guys? Some sort of rotten black brilliance was causing some serious torment in these dudes’ heads. How else could it be written? Definitely a poignant and early representation of how nail-biting, nervous and strung-out death metal would come to sound. A definite influence for me and Origin. Thank you for this song and album! Congratulations, gentlemen! You deserve it!

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Since we haven’t written about All Shall Perish in like forty-eight hours, it seems worth mentioning that the band has a new, David Brodsky-directed video, for the song “There is Nothing Left.” It’s really just a performance clip, but it’s an above-average performance clip, and Brodsky’s use of negative space is certainly a lot stronger than, say, that of whomever directed this piece of crap. Plus, the song slays, so that’s never a bad thing!

All Shall Perish’s This is Where it Ends is out now on Nuclear Blast. You can read our interview with guitarist Ben Orum here, and/or our interview with other guitarist Francesco Artusato here. We’ll also have a “Rigged” column from Francesco soon, so keep checking back for that!

-AR

So, to review the ways in bass players let us down this week:

• Coheed and Cambria’s Michael Todd robbed a pharmacy.
• Nick Oliveri from Queens of the Stone Age/Kyuss held his girlfriend hostage in a four-hour standoff with a S.W.A.T. team.
• Jeroen Paul Thessling quit Obscura.

We first interviewed All Shall Perish guitarist Ben Orum just about a year ago, at the 2010 edition of Summer Slaughter; at the time, ASP were only just starting to write their new album, This is Where it Ends. Orum turned out to be one of those rare dudes who’s not only really talented, but is also genuinely super-nice — and now that we’ve finally gotten to hear Ends, we’re happy to report that it’s totally excellent. In other words, this seemed like a good time to pester Orum again.

Luckily, he was happy to oblige us with some silly, and not-so-silly, e-mail questions. The two interviews make interesting pre- and post- album companion pieces, I think, so if you haven’t done so already, go back and read our initial conversation with Orum; then, after the jump, get his thoughts on how Ends actually turned out, the songwriting process for various songs on the album, what fans can expect from ASP’s set at this summer’s Mayhem Festival, the futility of giving death metal fans condoms, and more.

And, oh yeah, we’ll have a special “Rigged” column penned by Orum’s co-guitarist in All Shall Perish, Francesco Artusato, sometime soon, so definitely keep your eyes peeled for that.

And now… the interview!

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Between being announced as one of the participants of this summer’s Mayhem Festival, releasing video of guitarist Ben Orum doing pre-production for a new song, and now the below in-studio behind-the-scenes video, I’d say, yeah, the dudes in All Shall Perish have been nothing if not busy this week. And as an ASP fan, I ain’t compainin’.

Of course, the best part of any behind-the-scenes studio video is usually hearing at least a little bit of new music, and there’s no music to be heard here. But that doesn’t really bother me ’cause a) like I said, they just released a video with some new music earlier this week, and b) they actually took the time to make this clip entertaining, and not just the talking head “This album is gonna be so br00tal!” bullshit we so often see in these kinds of things. Check it out:

All Shall Perish’s latest, which still has yet to be named, should be out later this year on Nuclear Blast.

-AR

Speak of the devil! All Shall Perish were just announced as one of the acts on this year’s Mayhem Fest earlier today, and now they’ve posted the below video, which shows guitarist Ben Orum doing some pre-pro work in the studio. And while the track that plays in said video is unfinished (there’s no bass or vocals), it still gives you a pretty good sense of how at least one of the new ASP songs might sound.

Here’s what Orum told us about the new album when we interviewed him back in August:

“I think we’ve all come to an agreement that we want to have it more in the vein of The Price of Existence – but an updated version of it. With [then-guitarist] Chris Storey in the band, we went into this oddball shred direction that not all of us were really into. We loved the songs, don’t get me wrong, but we’d like to take it back to a heavier place.”

The tune in this video actually sounds to me like it’s a pretty fair compromise of Existence (which is a record I fucking love) and the band’s follow-up, Awaken the Dreamers (which I also really, really like, albeit not as much), but a) that’s not a bad thing and b) obviously, I’ll have to reserve final judgment for hearing the actual album.

In the meantime, check this shit out and see what you think…

-AR

[via The PRP]

Besides Times Square, this may be the single greatest use of resources in America. It’s a good thing we’re not in the middle of an energy crisis or anything.

So I wanna keep doing these regionally themed “Reader’s Choice” installments. And I know that last week I said I would do Vancouver and Peoria, but guess what? It’s our website, and we reserve the right to break our promises. I will try to get to Vancouver and Peoria (and by “get to” I mean “get writing about them,” not “get to going there”), but today I’m gonna do Vegas. ‘Cause I had one of the best nights of my life in Vegas, and ’cause longtime MetalSucks Maniac Samuel A. Favata sent me ten bands from the area to check out. That’s as complicated as my logic gets sometimes.

So… Vegas, baby, Vegas! Sorry. Couldn’t resist.

For reals, let’s do this:

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You may remember that last summer, Malevolent Creation guitarist Phil Fasciana claimed to have prevented a convenience store robbery by shooting the perpetrator in the face; he also claimed — and this was really the best part of his story — that the shop’s owner rewarded this mitzvah by offering him a free lifetime supply of chocolate milk. ‘Cause we all know that chocolate milk is what a man’s life is worth. Remember at the end of Die Hard, when John McClane saves the day, and his wife is all, “Oh, John, let’s make-up,” and he shoves her aside and goes, “No, just gimme my chocolate milk, bitch?” ‘Cause that’s just how shit like that goes down in real life.

You may also remember the shock we all felt when this highly plausible story turned out to be complete bullshit, and the heartbreak that ensued after Fasciana lashed out at interwebz dorks like us, insisting the story was true and telling webernet readers, “Get out of the house and maybe someone will try robbing and shooting you one day!!!!” Which is the reason I haven’t actually ventured outdoors since then; I’m just, like, super-afraid of becoming some chocolate milk fiend’s target, y’know?

And, hey, guess what? Looks Fasciana is acting like a nut case again!

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FRIENDLY REMINDER: Vince and I are taking over WSOU tomorrow from 4 -8! It’s the only radio station on the eastern seaboard that’s actually worth a damn, and it’s gonna have the awesomeness that is US, so listen in!!! We’ll be taking callers, too. If you live in the area, it’s 89.5 FM on your radio; everyone else can listen on the Internet right here.

And now here’s some things we did this week:

• We spoke to Decapitated’s Vogg, All Shall Perish’s Ben Orum, Within the Ruins’ Tim Goergen and Joe Cocchi, and Iron Thrones’ Steve Henningsgard.
• We debuted a new track by Moth Eater.
• We wondered, “What’s the big deal about Lady Gaga?” as she danced to Metallica.
• We rocked out to a newly-released Soundgarden song, and we couldn’t believe that the new Limp Bizkit song has a guitar solo!
• We commended Australia for its populations’ collective child-rearing skills.
• We marveled at this nine year’s old review of Reign in Blood.
• We sang Monster Magnet’s praises.
• We asked you to help us complete this Metal Map of America.
• We watched Kiss put the “ass” in “Massachusetts.”
• We wished Behemoth’s Nergal a speedy recovery.

Okay. I hope to hear some of your voices tomorrow! Seriously, guys. Listen. Call. Don’t make me sad. If you do, we’ll schedule Nu Metal Week to take place ASAP.

-AR

All Shall Perish have seen, in the words of guitarist Ben Orum, some “dark” times as of late: multiple lineup changes, creative challenges, touring drama, and, about a week and a half after we interviewed Orum, a van accident that threatened to derail their current stint on the MetalSucks co-sponsored Summer Slaughter Tour (the band has since re-joined the trek).

And like any good metal band, they’ve persevered despite all the bullshit. When we spoke to Orum just hours before Summer Slaughter’s recent stop in NYC kicked off, he seemed to be in high spirits. He says that this latest incarnation of the band is the best yet, and will return to the studio next year to make a record more in line with2006′s heavy-as-fuck The Price of Existence than 2008′s more melodious and noodlily Awaken the Dreamers. And when we saw the band play later that night, well… they killed it, and the crowd ate them up. A lot of the time you hear bands say “Well, this is our strongest line-up ever,” and it’s just hype; but Orum speaks the truth. This is All Shall Perish, and they’re better than ever.

Read the full transcript of our chat with Orum after the jump.

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As you’ve probably heard, All Shall Perish’s new album, Awaken the Dreamers, is slower and less brutal than its predecessors, Hate.Malice.Revenge and The Price of Existence – but it’s less brutal the way getting punched in the face is ultimately somewhat preferable to getting kicked in the nuts. This album is still heavy enough to make the listener feel like Billy Milano is sitting on his lap, and to bitch about its lack of br00tality is to be too close-minded for one’s own good.

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